Country Day Reclaims D3 Tennis Crown, Edges Cranbrook 34-33 — Same Score, New Champion

One point. That is all that separated our Detroit Country Day boys from Bloomfield Hills Cranbrook Kingswood at the Midland Tennis Center on Saturday, as Country Day took back the Lower Peninsula Division 3 Finals title by a 34-33 margin — the exact same score Cranbrook used to unseat the then-reigning co-champs a year ago. Call it the full circle: these two have finished first or second in some order nearly every season over the last 13, and Nicholas Fiaschetti's group answered back. The hero was sophomore Samuel Kole-James, who dropped his first set 6-2 at No. 2 singles and then clawed back to win the next two, 7-5 and 7-6(4), for a second-straight flight title. Freshman Nicholas Nadjarian took No. 4 singles, and the sophomore-junior duo of Sasha Kebl and Sebastian Shah grabbed a doubles crown of their own. Cranbrook won three flights and made us earn every bit of it — freshman Jacob Yang upsetting Ricky Jeong at No. 1 singles, Eli Rosen at No. 3, and seniors Ryan VanDyke and Josh Day at No. 1 doubles.